


The Proper Label

by that_sea_sponge



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Castiel in the Men of Letters Bunker (Supernatural), Denial, Humanity, Pining, Wishful Thinking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-08
Updated: 2018-12-08
Packaged: 2019-09-14 00:22:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 483
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16902549
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/that_sea_sponge/pseuds/that_sea_sponge
Summary: Castiel volunteered to inventory the Men of Letters' collection.





	The Proper Label

Castiel let out a frustrated sigh and rolled his eyes, thinking a silent blasphemous prayer. The heavy inventory book laying open on the rickety wooden storage cabinet had clearly never been reconciled with the actual contents of the cabinet itself. For scholars, the Men of Letters could be particularly negligent in their artifact filing. This was the third in a long row of tall, thin cabinets in a disused research room and, so far, all of the cabinets had been in a similar state. This one was supposed to be “Magical Talismans”. 

He’d done this to himself though, telling the Winchesters and the Newly Re-Alive Jack that he found the tedious work interesting. “Go out for a drive guys, I’ll be delighted…to trudge through hours of mislabeled cabinets in a dark room so dusty an angel could develop allergies.”

Putting his pen to aged paper, Castiel scratched out the filing cabinet’s existing content label and, in fluid angelic script, wrote 'Forgeries' atop the page. Contrary to the ledger, the cabinet contained fake cursed coins, counterfeit jewels, spells that promised eternal life but were more likely to give the spell caster awful nausea, and pointy rocks labeled Dragon’s Teeth. Cas couldn’t even conceive of why the original archivists even bothered adding these obvious imitations to the collection. 

He testily tapped his pen against the ledger and reminded himself that the archivist likely had not been acting in bad faith when the cabinet was put together. “Maybe he just wanted to believe so badly –“, the angel interrupted his own thought with a tired, dry laugh and slipped his hand into his coat’s pockets. He was far too acquainted with the things that humans could convince themselves of just because they needed to believe in something.

Something cold and metallic clinked against one of Cas’s fingernails. Humans weren’t the only of God’s creations that could ache for the impossible. Suddenly bone weary, in a gesture he’d probably originally witnessed from one Winchester or another, Cas roughly scrubbed his hair with is fingertips and slid his hands down to cover his eyes. He had to stop this. He had to find the strength to stop this. It would kill him if he didn't.

Castiel sighed again and with another flourish of his pen, added '& Fantasies' to the label at the top of the opened page. The ageless being rummaged through his pocket with his empty hand, withdrawing and trapping the metal object in a tight fist. He added, near the bottom of the page, ‘1 ring, handmade, Enochian inscribed “Eternal Light”’.

He placed the ring between the fake jewels and the immortality potion, slammed the cabinet shut and strode towards the stairs. The rest of the inventory could wait. The great thing about the life of an immortal hunter is that there is always something, somewhere that needs killing and the angel resolved to find one.


End file.
